This section provides background information relating to the present disclosure, which is not necessarily prior art.
With development and evolution of a wireless network, increasing services are carried by the wireless network. Therefore, extra spectrum resources are needed to support transmission of a great amount of data. Based on the existing long term evolution (LTE) network, a cellular wireless network operator starts to discuss how to use unauthorized spectrum resources, such as industrial scientific medical (ISM) frequency band of 5 GHz. The present disclosure relates to licensed assisted access (LAA) communication in the wireless communication network.
Channel detection can reduce interference and waste of frequency band use. The channel detection may be implemented by listen before talk (LBT). In the LBT, it is checked whether the channel is idle by clear channel assessment (CCA) before a channel or a carrier is used. In a case that a channel is idle, the channel may be accessed; and in a case that a channel is occupied, the channel cannot be accessed. Carrier aggregation is an important technology in the LTE system, and in the carrier aggregation, it is allowed to perform data transmission by a sending terminal on multiple adjacent or non-adjacent carriers. A utilization of a channel can be greatly improved by applying the carrier aggregation technology to the LAA system. In study on 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP) presently, no plausible solution is proposed for multi-carrier channel detection in the LAA system.
A solution for implementing multi-carrier channel detection in an LAA system is provided according to the present disclosure, including an uplink multi-carrier channel detection scheme and a downlink multi-carrier channel detection scheme, thereby improving a probability of accessing unauthorized carriers.